Long Time Coming Home
by LadySilver
Summary: Allison finds her efforts to reintegrate into BHHS challenged when Coach Finstock acts on a conclusion he's drawn about her. Meanwhile, Scott is distracted with trying to figure out whom his mother is secretly dating. Allison/Scott, Danny/Isaac, Melissa/Someone


_A/N: Written for htbthomas for the Teen Wolf Holidays exchange. Thank you to bethskink for all her help with this story as the word count kept exploding._

**Long Time Coming Home**

With the last cardboard box folded flat and stacked against the wall outside her bedroom, Allison was finally, officially unpacked and moved into Beacon Hills.

Unpacking had only taken her a year.

The last item to deal with was a framed picture of her mother-a studio portrait taken before their last Christmas together. Allison hung it on the wall next to her bed, her fingers skimming over the face of the woman who had given Allison everything. Tears stung her eyes but didn't fall. She was getting better at that. She was getting better at a lot of things. With each passing day, she felt... she wanted to say "more human," but considering the people she knew and what had happened between them, that was not the best phrase.

She had been pushed and pulled, manipulated, lied to, and surprised. She had been uprooted and underestimated. After all that, she had lashed back so hard that the wounds could never fully heal. Then she'd cut herself off from even those who had loved her, both as a punishment and a sacrifice.

Finally, long months later, she had come out the other side. She smiled at her mother's picture, an expression soft and sad, yet genuine, a smile that didn't make her cheeks hurt or stomach turn. It was a good feeling. After all the ways in which others tried to mold her, she finally felt like she'd found a shape that would hold.

Her return to being a real person started in the place she had ended: in Scott's bedroom, sitting on the end of his bed. He'd repainted the walls during the fall to a pale yellow-the color caught the sunlight streaming in through the windows-and updated his posters to advertise the new bands he'd discovered. In his worn jeans and raggedy red hoodie, he looked like she'd caught him on laundry day. He'd been letting his sideburns grow long and his hair flopped across his forehead in need of a cutting.

His eyes, though, when he saw her his brown eyes lit up the way a human's did. The joy that appeared broke through a graveness that didn't sit well on his features and he wrapped her in a hug powered with relief.

While she had seen him every day since school started and frequently throughout the summer when she and her father weren't traveling, sitting here with him now had her off-balance again. She sensed that whatever transpired in the next few minutes was going to _mean _more than anything they'd said before.

"I feel like I'm finally starting to get my feet under me," she told him, after they fell into a silence from exhausting the recap of that day. The small talk they usually exchanged came harder and left an artificial taste in her mouth; finally feeling safe enough to move beyond that was another sign that she was ready for this.

"I mean, I think I'll always be a little angry..." She twisted her hands together in her lap. "And hurt. I'm still hurt." Scott nodded as if he understood. In a way, he probably did. "But it's better now." He nodded again, his gaze never breaking from hers. He always gave his full attention to her without making it into a competition, accepted everything she said without judgment; she liked that about him. She crossed her feet at the ankles, feeling the metal zippers on her boots rub together.

"You've been through a lot," he told her. "No one blames you." He sounded like he meant it, though Allison couldn't imagine how it could be true. "At least things have finally calmed down. The Alpha pack is gone. All the hunters have left-"

"Except me and dad," she corrected. Odd how she didn't correct him on the statement about the blame. If she were Isaac, Erica, or Boyd, _she'd n_ever forgive her. Scott wasn't like that, though, which she also liked. That characteristic gave her even more reason to start her return to normalcy with him.

"All the i_bad/i _hunters have left," he told her. "Your dad's not trying to kill me anymore and you never did."

Allison ducked her head in chagrin. In her darkest moments, she'd considered killing Scott as easily as she'd considered killing Derek, as easily as she had tried to kill Erica and Boyd. She'd never told him that; it wasn't the kind of thing that came up in conversation. She opened her mouth to make that confession now. If they were going to start over, they needed to start with a clean slate.

"Allison, it's OK," Scott assured her.

"Scott, I-" Just like that, the words that had been rehearsed and lined up, waiting for this moment, fled. She was left staring at him, at the mole on his chin and the tiny scar beneath his eye, and her mouth was dry, her heart hammering in her chest. The air around her and Scott felt like it was growing thicker, enclosing them, isolating them. She couldn't hear anything beyond the blood sussurating in her ears.

Not knowing what else to do, she leaned into him and set her lips on his. It was more of a request for permission to kiss than a kiss, and for a second she thought he wasn't going to accept. His lips were warm and dry and still. And then they were pressing against hers and moving.

She inched closer, falling into a kiss that was sweeter and stronger than any she could remember, like a spiced candy. She closed her eyes and let her mouth part. She suddenly craved more of his kiss, needed it in a way that she had never needed anything.

Then Allison felt Scott tense, felt his fingers curl into the bedspread and his back straighten like he was steeling himself to break away. She pulled away first, a worried frown creasing her forehead. "I'm sorry. Sorry." She scooted back, opening a safer distance between them. "You don't want to kiss?" She tried not to let the hurt from his rejection into her question-with little success.

"What? No! I mean, yes. Yes, I really want to kiss you," Scott stammered. A blush crawled into his cheeks and he cast his eyes down as if now, after everything else, he needed to avoid her. "I'm just thinking."

"About what?" She smoothed the quilt with her fingers for something to do. He did the same thing, probably for the same reason. The tips of their fingers brushed in passing and a jolt passed through her.

"My mom," Scott replied, which only served to confuse Allison more. He was thinking about his mother while kissing her? "She's … never mind." He shook his head, dismissing whatever he was going to say next, then added, "She's not what's important right now. Do you want to try that kiss again?"

Allison did. She really did. The timing was wrong, though, and she didn't want their makeup kiss to be anything less than wonderful. "Tell me what's going on," she said, instead. "Maybe I can help."

Scott brightened, looking more like his old self than she'd seen him since … well, since she broke up with him. "Would you?" he asked.

She offered him the full glory of her dimples, and watched him melt a little. "Of course," she replied. To herself, she vowed to help solve whatever problem Scott was having as fast as she could if that's what it would take to finish what they'd started.

Allison was still mulling over what Scott had told her as she settled into the bleachers at the lacrosse game that night. She'd found a seat in the middle of the bleachers, taking advantage of the layers of people behind and above her to protect her from the bite of winter breeze that had picked up with sundown. She wore a woolen hat and scarf, and wished she had thought to put on gloves, too.

Mrs. McCall was sitting down the bench, far enough away that she probably didn't know Allison was there. It would make watching her easier, as long as Mrs. McCall didn't realize she was being watched. True, both women had come to see the game, but Allison had a secondary objective. Scott had asked her to see whom his mother spoke to, and Allison wouldn't be able to get an accurate read if Mrs. McCall thought she needed to be careful of what people saw.

"I think she's dating someone," Scott had told her earlier, with a cringe at the words. "She's been going 'out' a lot more than she used to and—" He bit his lip, as if afraid to disclose the next thing. "—I can tell that she's keeping something from me."

That struck Allison a little as 'turn about is fair play,' but she knew better than to say that. No one in Beacon Hills was innocent of keeping secrets; and everyone thought that their reasons were the most legitimate. "I thought you were okay with your mom dating again," she asked, puzzling over why Mrs. McCall would keep her dating life secret when she never had before.

"I was," Scott stated. "I am! I mean, if she brings Peter home again, I'll kill him." He shrugged like killing someone was the only logical course of action, which Allison supposed was true in this case. Peter was a murderer and a psychopath and any minute she had to spend with him was one minute too many. Scott's feelings on him were even stronger. She doubted that he would ever be able to forgive the one who had bit him and cursed him with being a werewolf.

They both tried to pretend that the solution to the mystery wasn't lying in front of them. Obviously, if Melissa was sneaking around with someone, it was because she knew Scott wouldn't approve-which had to mean that she was seeing Peter again. What Scott's mom saw in the man would forever remain a mystery to her.

Allison scanned the crowd at the game searching for any sign of Peter Hale. The attendance wasn't huge, probably because it was the first game of the season and because it was unseasonably cold, even for Northern California. She spotted Stiles on the bench, banging his feet against the ground—probably to keep them from going numb. Scott was out on the field, doing warm-up drills with the other members of the first line. Jackson was conspicuously absent. His jersey had been left draped over the bench in memoriam for what should have been his final season, a consolation prize that no doubt would tick him off if he knew.

Back in the stands, she saw Ms. Morrell and Mr. Martin and a lot of kids she recognized from her classes. Her sweep returned to Melissa just as Sheriff Stilinski slid into the seat next to her. Allison's eyes went wide and she caught herself leaning closer, craning to overhear their conversation. She'd never wished for werewolf hearing more than right now. Though she could see their lips moving, she couldn't hear anything over the hum of conversation from the other attendees.

Sheriff Stilinski held a paper wrapped hot dog out to Mrs. McCall, which she accepted with one hand while brushing her curly black hair back with the other. Unlike many of the other game attendees, Mrs. McCall hadn't worn a hat. Already, her ears looked red with cold.

"…show up to support the team," someone spoke in her face.

Allison jumped, slamming her hand into the bench by accident. The shock of pain that ran up her arm brought a swear to her tongue. She managed to bite it back with the recognition that the person speaking to her was Coach Finstock. He was standing in front of her, close enough that she could smell the reek of mint gum on his breath. He climbed the last step up to her, positioning himself such that she could no longer clearly see what was going on with Scott's mother.

"What? Oh. Yeah," she asked. She tried to peer around him, but he suddenly seemed to take up more breadth of space than he should, and he didn't seem like he planned to move on. Since he was clearly expecting an actual response, she smiled at him and said, "I'm here for the team."

The wind was ruffling Finstock's brown hair into a mess beyond his usual half-wild look. He wore a blue Beacon Hills sweatshirt and jeans, and she could only imagine that he must be freezing. "The team depends on the support of its fans," he informed her, as if she didn't know that. "Gotta keep the stands packed."

Allison stared at him, willing him to go away. What the hell was the Coach talking to her for? Didn't he have a team to worry about? From out on the field, she heard a whistle blow. A shout followed: one player trying to get another player's attention, she figured, or maybe a player trying to get his coach's attention. "OK," she answered.

Coach ignored it. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, then thrust out a plastic grocery store bag at her. "Keep up the good work."

The bag hung between them like an awkward confession and Allison tried in vain to remember if she'd left something in the locker room that afternoon that he'd be returning to her in person rather than depositing in the lost and found. Her purse was at home, she hadn't needed any sanitary products, she hadn't forgotten any clothing after changing in gym class… "What is it?" she asked. She accepted the bag tentatively. It was heavy and the plastic handles dug into her fingers.

"Got a couple things that I figured could help," he answered. He shifted his weight again, caught himself and set his stance even wider so that Allison would have to look between his legs if she wanted to see anything on the other side, and she wasn't willing to do that. "No need to thank me."

"Um, okay," she replied. She let the bag drop to the bench between her feet where she could keep it safe and keep it out of view. If Finstock really had brought her something personal, she didn't need other people finding out. The last thing she needed at BHHS was _more _rumors. Between her aunt's murder spree and her mother's suicide, her reputation was in the gutter and would probably never recover. If it weren't for Scott, she would be begging her father to move (what remained of) the family so that she could start over.

With her thoughts momentarily elsewhere, she missed the next thing Finstock said. He had dropped his hands to his side and clenched them into fists like it was taking all his willpower to stand there even one more second.

The correct thing to do was ask him to repeat, especially since he had done something nice for her. Possibly. But she could smell hot dogs on the breeze and that reminded her of a bigger goal. "OK," she said, one more time. She could be polite, but she didn't want to be so polite that he'd feel the need to keep trying to chat with her. How awkward would it be if he sat down and tried to talk to her.

Besides, the team needed him. Another whistle blew, longer and louder, and from the bench she heard a clear summons.

Finally, _finally_, he left.

Sheriff Stilinski and Mrs. McCall had finished their hot dogs and had brought their attention to the field, which was currently empty. Mrs. McCall pointed at something and Sheriff Stilinski's head tipped back in silent laughter.

"Scott," Allison spoke, hoping that he was listening and would turn around.

He didn't.

Coach had gathered the players together in a huddle and was talking to them. The waving of his hands grew ever more animated as he spoke, and Allison slumped down on the bench. Scott needed to see for himself what she saw. Sheriff Stilinski produced a blanket from somewhere and spread it over his and Mrs. McCall's laps, and she scooted a little closer to him. They could just be trying to stay warm, Allison thought. She tucked her own reddened hands under her legs. The cold from her skin seeped right through both her black jeans and the stockings she had had the foresight to put on underneath them. At least she had worn her fake-fur-lined boots so that her feet weren't cold, too.

Mrs. McCall smiled, her teeth flashing white. She looked genuinely happy in that moment, which made Allison realize how rarely she saw the older woman without worry lines etching her face. Sheriff Stilinski was the one responsible for that moment of abandon. Both the parents had been single for a while and they spent a lot of time together. Them getting together would make a lot of sense.

Allison couldn't get in the way of that. She, of all people, knew how important it was to carve out happiness where one could find it. No matter how uncomfortable it made her.

Then again, what she thought didn't matter. Mrs. McCall and Sheriff Stilinski weren't her parents. She idly poked at the idea of her father dating again, at there being a new woman in her life to fill the holes left gaping from her mother's death. Her thoughts recoiled; the idea was too alien. Her stomach roiled in protest and she had to swallow against a rise of bitterness in the back of her throat.

To distract herself, she reached for the plastic bag and spread the handles wide. Whatever was in there had to be better than imagining her father with a woman who wasn't her mother.

Nothing jumped out at her. Nothing could have.

The bag was filled with candles: little votive candles in red, blue, yellow, white. On top of the pile was a brand new box of blackboard chalk. She removed the box and turned it over in her hands, trying to puzzle out its significance. The school had finally renovated the last of its blackboard classrooms and replaced them with whiteboards over the summer, so the demand for chalk had dropped to nothing. Perhaps this was just Finstock's attempt to unload stockpiled school supplies on her. Though, what he thought she'd do with blackboard chalk was beyond her.

"What's that?" Lydia asked, sliding into the seat next to her as casually as if the last few months had never happened, as if her presence at Allison's side was a given rather than the complete surprise it was. Lydia had a tagboard sign in one hand that she slid up against the bench in front of them, the number eleven drawn in black marker with thick strokes. The sign would sit there until it was time to deploy it. In Lydia's other hand she carried a small bag of popcorn. She didn't offer the popcorn to Allison. As soon as the sign was out of the way, she withdrew a piece and stuck it in her mouth. She sucked on it a moment, then swallowed.

"Chalk," Allison answered, happy for one that she didn't like the popcorn served at the lacrosse games. Otherwise, Lydia would know that she'd gotten to her. Allison glanced into the bag again to confirm its contents. They hadn't changed. The plastic crinkled loud enough that Allison didn't know how everyone wasn't turning around to stare at her. "And candles?"

"Chalk and candles?" Lydia asked, the disbelief evident in her voice. She rifled through the bag for a moment, but found—as Allison had known she would—nothing besides the two named items.

"Chalk and candles," Allison repeated. She chewed her lip for a second, debating whether to tell Lydia the rest of the story, then decided that for her sake, she needed to. Lydia would demand to know eventually, and lying to her only created a lot more problems. She'd learned that lesson the hard way. They all had. She had set herself on a new path now and repeating the mistakes she had made before was not part of it.

Taking a fortifying breath, she explained the brief conversation with Finstock.

Lydia made her walk through it twice more, picking apart each word and questioning whether Allison had heard everything right. "So, you're supposed to do what with these?" Lydia asked. She turned a blue candle over in her hand. The wick was still white and waxy, the candle having never been used.

"Root for the team, I think," Allison replied. If Finstock's words had contained any other desire, she had missed it.

Lydia rolled her eyes and huffed, "Because that's all girls are good for, right? To cheer on the boys?"

"That is kinda what we're here for," Allison pointed out, gesturing to the bleachers and the attendees, including Mrs. McCall and Sheriff Stilinski, who had come to root on the boys' team. For all its success, the lacrosse team didn't rate actual cheerleaders. Lydia's sign flapped against the metal riser, awaiting its turn to be put to use. "I don't think he meant _cheerleading_."

Lydia's gaze narrowed and Allison could see her working through and discarding hypotheses about other possibilities. Her blue eyes were hard, like a shell covering the more delicate thoughts flittering behind them. Like Allison, she wore a hat and scarf to ward against the chill of the winter evening. Unlike Allison, she didn't look even the least bit cold. Her brown dress jacket with the fur-lined collar was buttoned up tight, but her hands were bare—the better to eat her popcorn with—and she sat on the metal bench without any indication of hunching or shivering. Another piece of popcorn went into her mouth and she chewed carefully. "Are you supposed to root for the team?" she asked, at last, "Or enchant the team?"

Allison's brow creased. "What do you mean?"

"Chalk and candles?" Lydia said. "They're two of the most basic components for casting spells." Off Allison's disbelieving expression, she clarified, "If you believe in magic. Which I don't." She huffed after the last, fooling no one. With Peter Hale walking around-somewhere other than the lacrosse field, as a quick glance verified-as living proof, not one of those who knew about him could claim to no longer believe in magic.

"He wants me to cast a spell on them?" Allison asked. She turned to look at Coach Finstock who was stomping along the players' bench, haranguing those who were not playing the game. From out on the field, Scott waved at her before settling into his defensive stance. She wondered if he'd heard or if he was just getting in the zone.

Lydia shrugged. "Either that, or he's preparing you in case the power goes out again. Did he give you a lighter?" She pulled the bag closer to her and shuffled through its contents before answering her own question with a sigh of resignation. "No lighter. I guess you're supposed to light these by staring at them really hard."

"I can't do magic," Allison protested.

"Tell him that." As if to punctuate her point, Lydia flipped her hair. With the hat holding her hair in place, the flip lost all but symbolic power.

Allison chewed on her lip as she watched the game. Beacon Hills scored its first point within seconds, which sent Coach Finstock to his feet with loud cheer and fist pump. Before the noise had settled down, he turned around, searching the stands like he had forgotten where she was sitting. He looked awfully dour for someone whose team had just scored, his expression souring more as he scanned the crowd. When he spotted her, he held one thumb up in a "good job" gesture. She smiled wanly back, though he turned away so fast that she doubted he saw it.

"What world does he live in?" Allison asked. "Have I ever done _anything _that would make someone think I was a witch?"

"If by 'witch' you actually mean a different word with most of the same letters, then I'd be the first to say yes. As your best friend, of course."

"Of course," Allison echoed sarcastically. Lydia's forthrightness didn't bother her, mostly because she knew it was true. If Lydia thought a little backbiting was her due, then Allison would let her have it. Better to let her get it out of her system.

"Since that's not what you meant, then I'm just going to have to remind the audience that Finstock is not exactly known for his solid mental connection to the real world."

"I only had the one class with him," Allison commented, and one class had been enough to see Finstock lose his temper over the strangest of things, such as Scott not doing the reading that one day. Another day, he'd had a tantrum when Greenberg scored a perfect grade on a pop quiz. Yet another had come when someone had tried to derail a class by asking for the story about Finstock's missing testicle.

"One class is all you need, dear," Lydia replied. "Trust me on this, the next time you take an Econ class, get a teacher who understands how differential equations work."

Allison's eyebrows went up at the sudden vehemence in Lydia's voice. "I need to go talk to him tomorrow and tell him that he's wrong," Allison said.

"He's so _very _wrong," Lydia added, with an exaggerated eye roll. "Math does not work that way."

"I meant about the whole magic thing." Allison waved her hand at the bag as if needing to emphasize her point. "I need to tell him that I can't do magic."

"Why?" Lydia placed another piece of popcorn in her mouth, setting it gently on her tongue like it was a snowflake. She let it sit there a second, softening, before chewing it. "It's his mistake. Imagine what you can get him to do if he thinks you'll turn him into a toad if he doesn't cooperate." Her eyes took on a shine; clearly i_she/i _was imagining turning him into a toad.

"Because I can't i_do_ii magic," Allison pointed out. It seemed like an important fact to her, one that shouldn't need as much repeating as it did. Beacon Hills had enough strange things going on in it without witches being factored in. "What if he keeps giving me things or-" She shuddered, the chill running the full length of her body. "Or what if he wants to help? God, how do I tell him? He's clearly already made up his mind."

"Hmm. I can see that being a problem." Lydia tapped her chin with one finger. "Let me think about it. I'm sure I can come up with something."

Allison tied the bag shut with its handles and tried to force the whole thing out of her mind. Nothing good was going to come of going with Lydia's plan, whatever it turned out to be. Ever since moving to Beacon Hills, Allison had been caught in one person's plan or another's, careening from one crisis to another. She had finally succeeded in carving out some sense of what she wanted and here it was being threatened all over again.

On the field, Scott caught the ball from one of the other players, then took off toward the opposing goal. Each step he took kicked tiny puffs of dust into the air that he was oblivious to, even with his advanced senses. He was focused only on scoring the team its next goal.

In the stands, his mother leaned forward, urging him to go faster. Her hands were clasped in front of her in silent prayer. Sheriff Stilinski's voice calling Scott's name rose over the chanting of the crowd.

Lydia rose to her feet, Scott's name joining the chorus from the other fans. She cupped her hands around her mouth to yell louder, the half-eaten bag of popcorn forgotten on the bench.

Grabbing the sign, Allison shook it in the air, adding her voice to the mix. Inwardly, all she could think was how lucky Mrs. McCall was to find happiness and how much Allison wished that her turn would come around. She wanted to be more than the puffs kicked up as others raced through life doing the exciting things, more than the ball in the crosse that they used to play their game. It seemed to her that going along with Lydia's plan or tacitly accepting Coach Finstock's role for her was only buying back into what she'd fought so hard to escape from, and she couldn't do that to anyone—much less herself—again.

"I figured it out," Allison told Scott when she caught up with him after the game. She had pulled him into a side hallway off the main corridor that lead to the locker room, hoping that a little privacy would help soften the blow. She hadn't invited Stiles, nor had Stiles insisted on inviting himself. On this issue, she could only deal with them one at a time.

Scott looked momentarily blank, his thoughts still on the game and the surprise comeback from the other team that had almost led to them winning had it not been for Danny's save in the last seconds. Scott's hair was still damp from his shower, his skin still flushed from the heat of the water and the excitement of the game. He smelled like rain.

She told him what she'd seen, trying to keep her tone neutral so that he could form his own opinion on the subject.

"My mom and Stiles's dad?" Scott asked after she finished. He shook his head. Tiny drops of water flew from his wet hair and speckled Allison's face. "They can't be. They're just friends." He'd already changed into his jeans and a long-sleeved black shirt which showed off the breadth of his chest more than was right.

"It's what I saw," Allison reminded him. She wiped a drop of water off her cheek with her thumb, which reminded her of Scott wiping her eyelash off her cheek once upon a time. The memory made her choke up. She had to blink back an urge to tear up before she could add, "I'm happy for them."

"I would be, too," Scott said, "Except there's no way. Stiles and I tried to get them together a couple years ago."

"What happened?"

Scott ducked his head and kicked at the ground with the toe of one sneakered foot. "We were grounded and told to let them make their own dating decisions."

Allison ran a comforting hand down Scott's arm. His muscles twitched beneath her touch. "Maybe they have," she suggested. Someday, she vowed to herself, she'd get the whole story out of him. Whatever he and Stiles had done to get their parents together had to be worth hearing.

Again, Scott shook his head. "I don't—" He glanced around quickly, as if checking for potential eavesdroppers. The hall remained empty. Its lights were dimmed to emergency settings which made Allison feel rebellious just by her presence in a place she wasn't supposed to be. If anyone was listening in on the conversation, it wasn't with human hearing. "I don't smell him on her," he confessed. "Not any more than usual, anyway."

"Okaaay," Allison replied. Adjusting to Scott casually being a werewolf around her was still slow going. While she'd known what he was for months, sometimes she forgot that he really _was _a werewolf. Then he'd say things like what he'd just said and the point was driven home all over again. "So go with that. Who do you smell on her?"

Scott cringed at her question. Sometimes he still had trouble with casually being a werewolf, too. "That's the problem. She works with people all day and sometimes she showers at work. I can't get—" He cut himself off in frustration, once more kicking at the floor. "All I know is she's not seeing the Sheriff."

"OK. Back to square one." Allison debated for a moment telling Scott about what Coach Finstock had done and what Lydia had said, then thought better of it.

Scott must have picked up some of her strife anyway. He captured her hands in his and pulled her close enough that she thought about trying to kiss him again. The warmth of his skin soaked into her still cold fingers. "Are you doing OK?" he asked her.

The answer was harder to come up with than she'd expected. She'd been telling people "fine" for so long that the word reflexively came to her tongue, but Scott would know that she didn't mean it. "Every day is one more day," she finally said.

"Yeah," he replied, as if he knew exactly what she was talking about. His brown eyes held such sincerity, his lips were so soft looking.

She felt bad for pulling her hands away and stepping back. Her boot heels clicked against the hard floor. "I have to get home. My dad worries."

"OK," Scott said, though it obviously pained him to agree so easily. "See you in school tomorrow."

"OK," Allison replied. Now that her father wasn't trying to kill Scott, maybe he wouldn't get in the way of them dating, either. She didn't want to make any promises that she'd have to go back on, so she bit her lip, gave Scott a quick hug, and hurried away before her own reluctance to leave could turn into excuses to stay.

Allison stood at her locker the next morning listening to the excitement from the previous night's win rumble through the halls. She unwound her scarf slowly and hung it carefully from the hook in her locker to give alibi to her eavesdropping. Her fellow students bounced down the hallway, recaps of the game's highlights careening off their lips in one breath with favorable forecasts for the rest of the season thrown in on the next. In her short time at Beacon Hills High, she had come to discover that the fanfare she'd seen given to the lacrosse team in her first days was capable only of escalation.

With the start of the first season without Jackson's leadership, the student body's cheer was louder than ever. Allison sensed a note of effort to it, though, like the students were crowing their support of the team to prove that they still could.

Yet, she wondered, how many of those same fans would be so proud of their school if they knew i_why_/ithe team had the success it did.

She pulled her gloves off one finger at a time. Before tucking them into the pockets of her coat, she took out the large rings she liked to wear that she couldn't wear under the restricting cloth of the gloves.

Her fingers fumbled and the filigreed ring with the green stone-a ring that had been her mother's- clattered to the floor. She started to bend down to retrieve it, one hand catching her long brown hair to keep it from tumbling into her face when a new hand swept into view.

Danny picked up the ring and held it out to her on his open palm. "Here," he said, by way of greeting.

"Thanks." Allison smiled, her dimples impressing themselves deep into her cheeks. She took the ring, checked it quickly for damage. It showed none so she slipped it on her index finger. "You guys had a great game last night."

Danny nodded, the compliment not fazing him one way or the other. Ever since Jackson's death, Danny had become even more reserved. He had on a pair of black jeans and a well-washed formerly-black t-shirt for i_The Matrix_/i. With so many of the other team members wearing their jerseys, his choice of wearing street clothes stuck out. "So, I'm supposed to give you a message. From Coach." He had his backpack slung over one shoulder which he shifted to his other.

Allison squashed the tremble of worry that tried to run through her body. Coach Finstock only i_thought/_he was someone to be feared, and he had no power over her anyway. "Oh?" A moment of concern flashed through her that Danny had more candles in his backpack and that she'd have to explain...something...to him about why Coach wanted her to have them.

Danny took a deep breath and let it out, his eyes crinkling in a preemptive apology. "I'm supposed to tell you—and these are his words—'Good job last night. Now keep your witchy fingers to yourself until I give you the all clear. Those bastards at the CIAA aren't going to find anything to run me out.'" He rubbed his hands against his legs as he finished the recitation and quirked an eyebrow up. "Should I even ask if you know what that means?"

Now it was Allison's turn to sigh. She finished hanging her coat in her locker, taking care to smooth out how the fabric draped. "You probably understand it as well as I do," she replied. She kept her face turned into her locker so that he wouldn't catch her tracing her eyebrow. Damn Scott for enlightening her about that tell. Now she caught herself doing it on those occasions when she still had to lie. No effort worked in unlearning the habit.

"I get the CIAA part," Danny mused. "We're supposed to be having drug testing today in practice. Some people are coming in from the state board to make sure we're all on the up-and-up. Coach is worried that he's going to lose his job if the tests come back positive."

"Aren't drug tests supposed to be a surprise?"

Danny shoved his hands in his pockets and rocked back on his heels. "Issac overheard Coach talking on the phone, and he told Scott, who told Stiles. You know how those guys are."

As if hearing his name summoned him, Isaac appeared out of the flow of passing students and settled next to Danny. He wore his jersey, though he kept his arms crossed over the front like he was trying to cover up the number. "You know how which guys are?" he asked. He cocked his head at Danny and smirked, already knowing the answer. "So you think that Scott and Stiles talk too much?"

Allison withdrew a step at Isaac's appearance, one hand going to her locker door in case she needed to slam it or hide behind it-for all the good a cheap piece of metal would do against werewolf strength. She had tried to kill Isaac, had stabbed him repeatedly and for no reason except to hurt him as badly as she could. His gaze swept over her now and she could feel him passing judgment. The tension ratcheted and Allison felt her face and upper chest growing warm under the scrutiny.

Danny cut the mood with a hard kiss on Isaac's lips, which had the side-effect of also erasing the smirk. "If we don't get moving," Danny told him, "we're going to be late for class."

For an instant, Allison thought she saw Isaac's eyes flash gold. She blinked and all she saw was blue, human eyes. Danny didn't know about werewolves, didn't know about Isaac or Scott. Or Jackson. It wasn't her business to tell him, and Isaac probably had his own reasons for waiting. Eventually, she knew, Danny would find out and the weight of all the secrets being loosed would probably crush him the way it had crushed her. Until then, he got to enjoy his time with his boyfriend, and that made her envious. Allison grabbed her textbooks out of her locker and shut the door with a loud clang.

"Are you sure you don't want to cut?" Isaac whispered, placing the words along Danny's cheekbone in an obvious invitation.

"Can't be at practice if we miss school," Danny reminded him, "And today's the wrong day to miss. We'd get kicked off the team."

"I'm willing to pay that price," Isaac said. He dropped his hand onto Danny's shoulder and gave a light squeeze that made Danny's heavy-lidded eyes go wide.

Danny shook himself free from Isaac and once again shifted his backpack, putting it on the shoulder between him and his boyfriend. "Tempting though the offer is, this is not how I want to end my lacrosse career. Coach says I've got what it takes to go to the next level. Besides, I'm not worried about a drug test. Are you?"

"No!" Isaac replied, a little too fast, a little too loud. Allison frowned at the response. Steroids wouldn't work in his system, but the test itself could turn out to be a problem if he couldn't control his healing-a detail which Allison suspected he was more concerned about than he was letting on. As if to disabuse her of the possibility that he worried about anything at all anymore, he cast a meaningful look at her and added, "All my talent is i_totally_/inatural." The smirk started to spread again, like it was his default expression.

Danny glanced from Isaac to Allison as if he could catch their in-joke with the skill that he caught attempted goals, then gave up with a shake of his head. "Do you have any messages to send back to Coach? If he's going to pay me the big bucks..."

"I'm fine," Allison answered, remembering Lydia's comment about the toad. If she were feeling braver, she'd try that one. It would only work, though, if she were able to spy on Coach when he i_got_/i the message. "I'll keep myself...to myself. I guess."

"I'll let him know you said that," Danny said.

Isaac rolled his shoulders, his impatience with the conversation obvious. "Come on. It's bad enough that you're making me behave. I don't need to be bored to death, too." He started down the hall, Danny falling into step next to him, a final glance back at her offering one more apology that wasn't his to give.

"Don't worry, Isaac," Allison called after them. "I'm sure the blood test won't hurt at all."

Isaac stuck his hand behind his back and flipped her the bird, never once faltering in his step. She giggled, not even sure what method the drug test was going to use, but liking how normal his response was. She didn't think they could be friends; she'd ended that when she had rammed the knives in his chest. They'd fought together since then as reluctant allies, so she knew he didn't completely hate her. If they could be teens now, just highschoolers who ran with the same overlapping groups, that would be enough.

She watched as Isaac slipped his arm around Danny's waist, casual yet hesitant like he was trying not to get caught. The boys' heights matched, though Isaac was lankier and prone to slouching. Danny was broader and more confident. He brought his hand to rest on Isaac's ass, no hesitation at all.

Hugging her books to her chest, she started toward her classroom. The hallway was abuzz with activity, which made navigating it troublesome-especially since her mind wasn't really on the task. Out of nowhere, she had the disconcerting sensation of every first day walking the halls of her new schools, all rolled into one. The other kids rushed to their classes or dawdled for a few more minutes by their lockers or congregated with friends in the hallway, and none of them had time for her. Her step started to slow, the edges of her books started to dig into her chest.

"It's not Peter," Scott said, appearing at her side from out the stream of traffic. "I was so sure it was him."

Allison tripped, a startled "oh" forming on her lips. She regained her balance quickly, but not without old doubt rearing up: She half-expected someone in the crowd to start a slow clap at her clumsiness. She shook it off as Scott's comment penetrated her brain. "Where did you come from? How do you know it's not him?"

He wore his backpack on both shoulders, his lacrosse stick strung through the straps and bobbing behind him. His hoodie hung open over his jersey. A large grass stain marred the front of the hoodie and a streak of mud stained the thigh of his jeans. The cuffs of both legs looked wet and his shoes left behind muddy tracks. "I had a talk with him," he answered. He gripped his brown hair with both hands, briefly locking his fingers behind his head.

Allison raised her eyebrows, assuming that the 'talk' had involved some violence if Scott's dishevelment was anything to go by. Any wounds he had acquired had long since healed, though smudges on his face and neck showed where they probably had been. As much as she wanted to know more, the school hallway wasn't the place to press for details. She made a mental note to ask him later; any excuse to hear about Peter losing a fight was a good one. "And you believe him? Are you sure he's telling the truth?"

"I know he's not lying," Scott answered. "Why is this so hard? Why wouldn't she just _tell _me?"

"She must have a good reason. Maybe she didn't want to get your hopes up until she knew if the relationship was going anywhere. Do you know if Coach Finstock has a class first hour?"

Scott pulled a face, though in response to which question she didn't know. "Maybe? I don't know. Why?"

Allison came to a stop in the hallway, dragging Scott to a halt with her. Pairs of fellow students swerved around the sudden blockade, though Allison didn't care. "Because I need to talk to him. He thinks I can... _do_...things." They'd been walking toward Finstock's office, away from the academic wing of the building. At this juncture the lingering smell of sausage patties and eggs from the school cafeteria competed with the pervasive scent of sweat and air freshener from the locker rooms. Allison wrinkled her nose against them.

"You can do things." Scott answered.

"No, like-" Allison glanced around furtively, lowered her voice. "-Magic. He thinks I can do magic." She pursed her lips while she gathered her thoughts, then filled him in. Her run-in with the coach, the candles, the conversation with Danny. On retelling, her conclusion struck her as little more than those an overactive imagination might concoct and she felt a touch of paranoia.

Scott never doubted her. He listened to the whole thing without so much as cracking a smile. When she was finished, he summarized: "He thinks you're a witch?" He thought about it for a moment, his hands tightening and loosening their grip on the straps of his backpack. "Yeah, OK. I guess that makes sense. Every time you come to a game, amazing things happen."

"I've been to all the games. Except the Final." She fiddled with her ring while she tried not to think too hard about what she had missed and why. With all the commotion at the game, her absence wouldn't have been noticed. "Which he probably assumed I was at," she concluded.

"Exactly. And all the strange things started to happen right after you moved here."

"Strange things that I didn't even know about!" She rocked back on the heels of her boots, arms thrown out in exasperation.

A look of guilt flashed across Scott's face and Allison reassured him with a light touch to his face that she didn't hold his secrecy against him. Considering how knowing about werewolves had turned out, sometimes she wished that the secret had never been broken, that she had never been tasked with carrying the burden of that knowledge. Scott's navigation through those waters had been rough; hers had been rougher. How different their lives would have been if the supernatural didn't exist.

"I think it makes sense," Scott confirmed. "It's wrong, but it makes sense."

"Which explains the candles. He wants to make sure the team keeps winning and he thinks I'm the one responsible for that." Allison shook her head. "And, yet, I'm perfectly ordinary."

"I think you're magical," Scott countered. Allison blushed, the warmth brightening her face so much that she was surprised it didn't reflect off Scott's eyes. He let go of the straps and took her hands in his, like he'd wanted to all along and just now lost his ability to resist. His skin was dark against hers, the contrast so familiar and right that she couldn't believe she'd gone so long without it. Tangling their fingers together, she brought their clasped hands up for a gentle kiss.

The bell rang, shattering the moment. Students began to filter into their classrooms, rapidly emptying the hallway. Scott and Allison stayed unmoving, a token attempt on Allison's part to pull away abandoned because she'd have to go a different direction than Scott and she didn't want to.

"I'm going to tell him," Scott said, suddenly. His voice was too loud for the nearly empty hall. He cleared his throat and repeated, softer and more earnestly: "I'm going to tell him."

Allison blinked. "Tell who what?"

"I'm going to tell Coach about…you know." A pained expression crossed his face then, as if even he couldn't believe his words. He cringed, but didn't pull away.

"Are you sure you wanna do that?"

With his eyebrows twisted together, Scott nodded. "I think I have to. He obviously knows something is up and now that he's looking for supernatural explanations, he's going to notice things. Plus there's the drug tests, and those will come back negative-at least on me and Isaac-and we're the ones most under suspicion. So, yeah."

"Then we'll go together," Allison stated, the decision sudden yet obvious. _Whatever you're going to do, do with confidence__, _she remembered her mother telling her. If they were going to confront Finstock, then they needed to do it without fear. For a second, Scott looked like he was going to argue; something in her expression ended the protestation before he could make it. Instead, he took a small step back so that she could lead the way.

With her mother's voice echoing in her head as her guide, she squared her shoulders and headed down the last stretch of hallway to Coach's office, hand-in-hand with Scott.

Finstock's office was empty when they got there. Allison peered through the window at the messy interior—papers stacked on the desk, coffee rings imprinted on the wooden desk, an overflowing garbage can—before trying the knob. It turned easily.

"Last chance to change your mind," she said to Scott.

He tipped his head back and groaned at the ceiling. For a moment, Allison thought he might actually change his mind. She watched his face carefully, searching for expanding sideburns or a glimmer of yellow in his eyes: some sign he wouldn't be able to emotionally handle outing himself to his coach. Nothing happened.

Allison pushed the door open and stuck her head inside. "Mr. Finstock," she called. No answer. A half-drunk cup of coffee sat cooling on his desk. His brown pleather jacket was slung over the back of his chair. He probably did have a first hour class, which would really throw a wrench in the works because then she and Scott would have to come back. Getting her nerve up once had been hard enough. Doing it twice seemed unfathomable.

From next to her, Scott peered around the messy office. Then he stuck his nose in the air and sniffed.

"Anything?" Allison asked.

"Nah. He's got a peanut butter sandwich rotting in the bottom of his garbage can and most of his markers are dead, but... He must really have a lot on his mind. This isn't like him."

That information didn't help. Allison sighed. "I guess we wait?" She turned a slow circle looking for a chair or even a relatively clear patch of wall to lean against. Aside from Coach's desk chair, there wasn't anything. It had to be a ploy to get people to leave, Allison thought. Without a chair, no one would sit and chat. She could see that appealing to him.

Scott drifted over to the desk and began looking at the papers from his upside down vantage point. A moment later, he motioned Allison over. "I think Coach is really in trouble." He gestured to the paper underneath the coffee mug.

Though some of the letters were obscured or smeared with the coffee ring, she was able to get the gist. The CIAA was basically accusing the Beacon Hills lacrosse team of drug use on the grounds that their win against the Sycamore Beavers was unbelievable. If, the politely phrased letter continued, drug use was discovered, the team would be suspended indefinitely and their trophy retracted. Further, the CIAA would begin proceedings against Finstock to get him fired.

"Wow," Allison breathed. "No wonder he's being so weird." She slipped the page back under the coffee mug, doing her best to align the ring so that their spying wouldn't be discovered.

"Not any weirder than normal. It does explain the mess, though. I definitely need to-" Scott's head shot up. He tracked his eyes to the desk, but didn't otherwise move.

"What?" Allison asked.

"His phone."

Listening hard, Allison picked up on the faint staccato buzzing of a cell phone's ring coming from within the desk drawer. Before she knew what she was doing, she crossed to the desk and slid the drawer open. The expected cell phone was crammed in among more papers, its face lit up with the green glow of active use. She should have closed the drawer and walked away; they hadn't come into the office to snoop and they'd already done more than she was comfortable with. She should have, but she didn't.

She read the text message on display-

-and swallowed hard. Her fingers grasped at the edge of the desk in a desperate bid for stability.

"What's wrong?" Scott asked. He was at her side so fast that the corners of the papers on the desk fluttered.

Wordlessly, she pointed to the display.

Scott leaned over her to read it. He froze. Allison couldn't even feel his exhalations against her ear.

From out in the hall, she heard the distant thunk of a door slamming shut and the squeaking wheels of a custodian's mop bucket going past.

Then, from Scott, came a hollow, "Crap."

"Well, I guess that answers that question," Allison commented. She read the text one more time just to make sure that she and Scott weren't both misreading it. They weren't. She quietly slid the drawer closed so that she wouldn't keep reading the screen. Twice was bad enough. She was never going to be able to unsee what it had said, or see Mrs. McCall in same way again.

"I would have been happier if it had been Peter."

"Not true," Allison countered.

Scott swallowed, then forced out a hard breath. "Okay, not true," he conceded. He dragged his hands through his hair, gripping the back of his head. "What am I going to do?"

"We could be wrong," Allison suggested, grasping for any consolation. "Wouldn't you have smelled him on her?"

A visible shudder passed through Scott. "I probably did. With all the time _I_ spend around him, I never thought about why his smell..." He shuddered again. "Oh, god."

The office door banged open. Allison and Scott scrambled to the other side of the desk, guilt painting their faces, at the sight of Coach standing in the doorway. He had his clipboard tucked under one arm and a water bottle clenched in his hand. A scowl twisted his mouth.

"Do I even want to know?" Coach demanded.

"We, uh. We came to talk to you," Allison stammered. She had to force herself not to grab Scott's hand again, not to hunker down into her own shoulders or to apologize and try to escape without doing what they'd come here to do.

Coach stood stolid, his expression unchanging as he looked back and forth from Allison to Scott. "I probably don't want to know. What you kids do on your time is your business. Rumor has it that the school has some excellent counselors who can-"

"It's not...that," Scott interrupted. "Whatever you think _that _is. It's not. It's-" He squeezed his eyes shut and gnawed on his lip. The question, when it finally came, spilled out in one rush: "Did my mom tell you about me?"

Coach crossed to his desk, tossing the clipboard onto a stack of papers that started to topple over and setting the water bottle down next to the coffee cup-right on the letter from the CIAA. He clearly wasn't impressed with their threats. "McCall," Coach answered. "Mc. Call. You think I _wouldn't_ know who you are? What goes through that head of yours? Your mother is not the kind of woman to lie about having kids. Kid. I have nothing against kids. She'd better not want any more, though, because I-"

Allison cleared her throat loudly. The panic flooding Scott's face frightened her and she had to do something before he fled the room and left her alone with the coach. "That's not what he meant." She couldn't help but note that Coach wasn't surprised by Scott knowing about _him_. She wondered what Scott's mom had told her new boyfriend.

"What else could he mean? Most women my age have kids. It's something you have to accept if you're going to date. You got an issue with me dating a beautiful woman, McCall?"

"No," Scott squeaked. "It's just...I'm…" He looked at Allison for support. All she could offer was a wan smile and reassuring thoughts that he hoped he could sense. "I'm a werewolf."

Coach picked up his coffee cup and took a long, loud swallow.

"And I'm _not_ a witch," Allison chimed into the silence. She folded her hands behind her back and tried to stand up straighter. Her knees wouldn't stop shaking. She'd faced down an Alpha werewolf, a kanima, and her own grandfather, and this is what was making her nervous? She willed her knees to stop, to no avail.

Coach returned the mug to its circle on the desk and lowered himself into his chair. It rolled back slightly under his weight. Something crunched under one wheel.

"I'm not the only one, either," Scott added. "On the team, I mean." Or in the school, Allison mentally added, though she didn't think Coach needed to know about that.

"Werewolves?" Coach stated, the word flat like he had no idea what it meant. He nodded slowly, processing. "On my team? More than one?" The rhetorical questions hanging in the air, he pinched the bridge of his nose and shook his head heavily. "For the love of God, McCall, you'd better not be talking about Greenberg."

"Uh. No?" Scott glanced at Allison again and she shrugged. Unless Derek had gone on another biting spree, the only werewolves in the school were Scott, Erica, Boyd, and Isaac—which were already too many, as far as both of them were concerned. "No, not Greenberg."

"Good. That boy is barely human as it is." Coach blew out a breath and started tapping his fingers on one of the stacks on his desk, his gaze turned inward as he worked through his new information. "So, what you're saying is: the team doesn't have a drug problem; it has a full moon problem?"

"That's…one way to look at it," Scott answered, his confusion echoed in Allison's expression.

Slapping the desk, Coach exclaimed, "Well, that's a relief. Tell me one thing: Will the—" He whirled a hand in the air as he sought to yank the right word from the ether—"whatever it is that makes you what you are won't show up in a urine test?"

"I-I don't think so?" Scott replied. His eyebrows quirked up in surprise at the question.

"Coach, don't you want some proof?" Allison asked. She cast a glance at Scott who had his bottom lip captured between his teeth. No fangs showed, but a glint in his eye told her that he only needed a little push and they'd emerge.

"Proof? I've seen all kinds of proof! How about a blood test?" Coach bulled on. "Will it show up in a blood test?" He was leaning forward onto the desk now, his shoulders tensed.

Scott shook his head in the negative, though Allison wondered if anyone had answered that question for sure or if Scott was just guessing. He raised his arms as if to add something, maybe offer a correction, then dropped them without comment.

Coach hummed in thought, his finger tapping, tapping against the DVD case for _The Craft_-and was that were he had done his research, Allison wondered. Was he going to rush out and rent a copy of _Cursed_ for his next act? Finally, Coach pushed himself upright. Yanking open one of the lower desk drawers, he withdrew a compact book which he proceeded to flip through. Its pages were heavily marked with index tabs and colored with yellow highlighter. He found the section he wanted, scanned the contents, then threw the book down onto the desk. "Werewolves aren't against the rules," he proclaimed.

Both Scott and Allison's eyes went wide. Neither of them wanted to bring up the ethical issues with fielding supernaturally enhanced people, yet the point did need to be addressed now that the rule book was officially being brought into play.

"Don't look at me that way," Finstock interrupted. "If Sycamore is allowed to have a mutant like Abamowitz on the team, then I'm allowed to have werewolves. There's nothing in the rules that says I can't, and I don't want to hear one word from either of you!"

Scott made a zipping motion over his mouth.

"And, you," Finstock added, aiming a finger at Allison, "I expect your continued support of the team. You need herbs or rocks or anything, you just let me know. But don't go asking me for eyes. I won't do eyes. That's just disgusting."

Allison opened her mouth to correct him, again, but a small shake of Scott's head stayed her. _Let him_, Scott's expression seemed to say. _It makes it easier__._

As much as a part of her wanted to set the record straight, she kind of liked the idea of being a witch—only if it wasn't for real. With everything else that was going on, she had a feeling that the toad threat could turn out to be useful. "OK," she said instead, "No eyes."

"Good. Now get out of here. Don't you two have classes to get to?"

"Can we, uh…" Scott licked his lips. "Can we get a pass?"

Coach scoffed, but reached for the pass booklet anyway. For a moment, his normal energy diminished and Coach, and the mood in the room, turned serious. "McCall," he started, "your mother's a good woman. Don't you worry about me treating her right." As he handed the signed slips of paper over, he added, "Not a word of what we discussed leaves here. What we said in here, stays in here. Loose lips sink ships, you know."

Allison and Scott accepted the passes without comment, neither quite sure what to say. If Allison was reading things right, Coach had not only adapted to the idea of werewolves with all the effort it took for dead skin to slough off, but he'd promised to keep Scott's secret. She had no idea he was capable of being like that. Maybe he and Mrs. McCall did have potential.

Thoughts once again buzzing, they left the office, closing the door softly behind them. Before it finished shutting, Allison heard Coach mutter, "God damn werewolves."

Allison bumped Scott's shoulder with hers and whispered, "He's still not Peter."

The expression on Scott's face was…one Lydia would love to have evidence of. Strictly for scientific purposes, of course. She left her phone in her pocket. Some things she wasn't willing to share.

Getting through the rest of the morning without seeing Scott and without chewing her nails off took Allison more self-control than she could have imagined.

Scott texted her frequently since they had no classes together until after lunch. "Thinking of you," he sent at 8:53. Eight minutes later, his next text said only, "Coach?"

"Coach Step-dad," she teased back.

"I forgive you," he returned. Her eyes got misty at that one. She knew he meant for the joke, but it was hard not to take it in reference to _everything_.

"Because you love me," she texted back at 9:32, when Harris's back was turned.

"It's fate," he replied. That text came through in less than 20 seconds.

She saw Scott at lunch, where they sat next to each other at one of the long cafeteria tables like old times, trading shy, secretive glances. The hum and clatter of the cafeteria made the kind of conversation she thought they needed impossible. Stiles sat across from them systematically removing the little onions that came with his peas to an empty part of his tray. "Can you believe the school is actually _trying _to give us onion breath?" he complained. "It's like they don't want us to talk."

"They could just be trying to cut down on kissing," Allison suggested, shooting Scott a sideways look through her lashes.

Scott yanked his head back toward his tray like he knew he'd been caught staring. "I don't think these kinds of onions cause bad breath," he commented. Even so, he, too, started to push his into a separate pile to be ignored.

"It doesn't matter," Allison added. "A little bad breath wouldn't stop me. Not that you have bad breath."

"You don't either," Scott said. "Not that I'd care if you did."

"God, you two," Stiles replied. He stabbed another onion and saved its formerly adjacent peas from its contamination. Whether or not he would eat the peas remained to be seen. The small bowl in which the vegetables were served was soon cleared. In that time, Allison and Scott's hands had found each other under the table. Their fingers wove together with Scott's canted over hers so that the ring pressed into her skin as a solid reminder of its presence. Stiles caught the tiny look she graced Scott with from beneath her eyelashes, bent over and peered under the table. When he returned upright, he had a wide smile plastered on his face. "It's about freakin' time," he laughed.

Allison had to agree. The year had been a long one with ups and downs of such extremes that only someone who had been there with her would believe it. She gave Scott's hand a light squeeze which he met and matched. Across from them Stiles was still busily organizing the rest of his food into 'eat' and 'don't eat' piles.

Lydia slid into the seat on her other side and reached across her to waggle her fingers in greeting to Scott who rolled his eyes back at her. "So, this is obviously too good of an opportunity to throw away…" Lydia began. Allison tuned her out, but only for now. She knew she'd get the full plan again later with revisions to account for any points Stiles brought up that Lydia deemed worth listening to.

She spotted Danny and Isaac at the next table over. They were staring at whatever was on the screen of Danny's laptop, which was open in front of them. Isaac's eyes flickered up when Allison gaze landed on him, and he didn't say anything, but he didn't appear uncomfortable or defensive either, and that seemed like real progress. She offered a small smile, which he returned with a quirk of an eyebrow before going back to what he had been doing. His eyes stayed human-blue the whole time.

In the last year, she'd gained and lost her first boyfriend, had her heart broken, made friends, lost family, come into her legacy, lost her mind and struggled to find it again. She'd learned about werewolves and been accused of being a witch and learned what people could do when they were desperate enough.

None of this was what Allison had expected when she'd moved to Beacon Hills and so much of it she would undo in a heartbeat if she had the chance. Still, sitting at this table on this day with these people, she couldn't deny how good it was to have finally come home.


End file.
